Thread: Anyone have any stories of street racing back in the 50's & 60's?

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I've always been intrigued by days when a group would gather on some street and drag race. Yeah sure, the kids still do it with their little hondas and stuff today, but it seems like there was a whole lot more character to it back then. Unfortunately I'm not old enough to have witnessed the fun, so can anyone share some storries?

Thanks!

Street racing in the '50s or '60s? A little before my time... However, street racing in the early and mid '70s, now THAT was a party! Hooking up with the L.A. Street Racers every week at Brookhurst and La Palma (?) and test and tune and grudge racing at The County. Getting busted by LA county sherrif's at Nabisco at 1am, running every car in sight on La Palma...damn that was GREAT! In case there are some non-SoCal readers, I lived (and still live) in Orange County, California. Would I let my boys do it today? No F'in way. That was a different time. We raced for pinks occaisionally and it was rare for someone to welch on a bet. Today? Hell, they'd pull a gun because they lost!
The '68 will go to the track again, and the boys are welcome to follow in Dad's steps as long as it's on the strip (non-NHRA tracks).
More later.
BB

Although I did some street racing, most of my legitimate racing was done at Lions Drag strip in Wimington, Ca. Great times, great friends. I had a '66 Chevelle, built 327 with 4.88 gears. I couldn't drive freeways and had no trailer, so I took Alameda Ave. down for about 30 miles to get to Lions. Being from Los Angeles, my street racing was done at the Silverlake straightaway and the Glendale 2 freeway before it was completed. Riverside Drive was a great hangout as well.

Todays racers are using too many new gadgets, air shifters, electronic devices, etc. Thats why I plan to race with the Good Guys this season.

bb427stang, before my times too. You brought up the point that the times are much different, and you wouldn't allow your children to do it. That's kinda why I asked the question. I never experienced any of this, unfortunately. Man, I bet the adrenelin was rushing when you raced for pinks.

Ron, how many cars and people would show up for the street races back then? Race with the good guys? Details?

It would depend on when and what time. Many times, it was just me and the guyI'm racing. The big crowd would be in the Crenshaw area when Big Willy was running the street races. He'd bring out a Christmas tree for starting lights and I would guess 50-75 cars would be out there, both racing and spectating. Police would come and everyone would just take off. Unlike today, the police didn't take any action against the spectators. Today, I understand they can confiscate your vehicle just for watching!

The GoodGuys Association puts on nostalgia drag race meets and car shows. They allow only '72 and older cars. Drag racing is of the 60's and 70's, front engine dragsters, no nitrous, no electronic timing device, air shifters, etc. They conduct meets and car shows all over the country. Great association. I'd recommend attending their events when in your vicinity.

I grew up in Detroit & spent a good deal of time (early 60's) on Woodward Avenue. It wasn't uncommon to see trailered rigs show up on the weekends from Ohio, NY, NJ. and IL. The factory engineers were there too... trying out their latest stuff on the street. It would be impossible to guess the number of cars running on Woodward on A typical weekend, but I know it would be in the thousands. I've seen pretty much everything you can imagine running on the streets back then.... Remember, it was a completely different time.. urban sprawl hadn't taken over the out lying areas & "civilian" traffic was just about non-existant after 11:00 P.M. Oh, and there was hundreds of drive-in restaurants that catered to the car crowd back then, not like today.

Originally posted by Brent Mills
I've always been intrigued by days when a group would gather on some street and drag race. Yeah sure, the kids still do it with their little hondas and stuff today, but it seems like there was a whole lot more character to it back then. Unfortunately I'm not old enough to have witnessed the fun, so can anyone share some storries?

Thanks!

I Grew Up in the 60's Racing on the Berlin Turnpike here in Ct. I drive a 55 Chevy Conv. with a 327 with daul quads. Just about all my buddies drove Chevys. What a time we had on Sat. night by Mcdonalds. Thats when Isky had the 5 cyle cam. My brother in law drove a 55 with a 370 Pontiac. There was I guy named paul that had a 418 pontiac with daul quads and a 5 cycle cam in a 32 ford streetrod. Man was that quick. I'm a little smarter now I don't street any more. (Well once in awhile) We had Ct. Dragway back then, it has since been turned into a consumer test track. What a bummer. I can remember sunday afternoons watching Big daddy don Garlits, Tasca ford and all Mopar Hemi's run.

Hey Dyno Don-

I'm originally from So. Calif. But I know a couple of guys that grew up in Detroit. They told me stories similar to yours. They said that guys drove different makes of cars depending on if they lived near Chrysler, GM, Ford, etc. One of these guys is Larry Lewis, who was on one of the original Ramcharger teams.

One of these days I'm going to get up to the Woodward cruise. I hear it's really a blast.

Ron

HI Ron, I haven't made it back for a Woodward Cruise yet, but I guess there are close to 1.5 million people that show up for the week long fun. I did talk to a one of the original guys that helped put the Cruise together... he said it is getting rather commercialized now.....watch for it to be a nationally televised event soon. Unfortunately, the media people that cover the Cruise have absolutely no idea what they're talking about. They should have SpeedVision or TNN cover it instead of the local dupes.

In about 1966, I was stationed at McClellan AFB in Sacramento, CA. I had a 1959 Plymouth Sport Fury with the 361 ram induction engine. It was a mid to low 14 second car bone stock. I would sometimes like to "pick on" GTO's at the stoplight. One evening in eary fall, I got up next to a "Goat" who did not respect my Mopar. It was sprinkling at the time and the pavement was wet. Well when the light changed,I "dropped the hammer" and there was a lot of wheel spin. I glanced at my rear view mirror and saw red lights flashing. A Sacramento County Sheriff's Deputy had been right behind me!! Lucky for me, he was also a hotrodder and let me go with a warning ( after I cleaned the mud from the windshield of his cruiser)Of course, I continued to hunt forChevs,Goats and Fords to beat. Now I still have the memorys of those fun times.
















chevs,Fords and GT

Hmmmm! War stories!!!

Since street racing is illegal, I'm sure I never did anything like that! But I do remember some speed demonstrations!

I remember a visit to Las Vegas in the summer of 1967. Some kid in a 396 Chevelle (probably a 325 hp version) was raggin' on my '58 Delrey. I guess he didn't like yellow, poor boy cars. He had no clue about earlier Chev performance stuff, just that the car his daddy bought him was the neatest thing on four wheels. A brief encounter on a straight, back road showed him that Chevie's earlier big block with tri-power, a bit of an overbore, and a gnarly cam, could thump his mellon. He was fairly quiet after that .

Hey now, sure it is illeagle, but it was still fun. I did a lot of stop-light drag racing in the days. Not now because I no longer own anything that could " blow the doors off" of anything. But I may still have some tricks up my sleeve. It was fun back then was it not??

Ok Brent,

I couldn't drive in the 50's, but I went with older kids who could. Our races were started by a flagger standing between and in front of the racers. More than once the flagger had to be quick to get out of the way of a wild fishtail.

Cops would sometimes show up, but usually it was all over before they even got close and I don't remember anyone getting tickets. Probably, because nothing was scheduled. It was always impromptu and never at the same time or even on the same day. It usually got started when somebody showed off at a stoplight and met later at the drive in to talk about it.

Our early king of the midnight drags was an old style T bucket ,black primered metal body and all with a 53 Merc flat head with tri power. Had a LaSalle transmission and a Halibrand quick change rear end. Biggest tires he could get were the old 9.00x15 ambulance tires and he could smoke 'em through first and second.

Later on when I was old enough, we had a place south of town called "The Sludge". Had about a mile of straight road and easy to see both ends to watch for Gendarmes. At times 40 or 50 cars would show up. Mostly spectators who heard "something was going on". Maybe a dozen or so cars would actually race. No pink slips, just braggin' rights. It was an elimination race and a "run what ya brung". by then, (mid to late 60's) it was mostly muscle cars and Corvettes. If a "certain car" didn't show up, a Corvette most often won. The "certain car", was a 53 Ford tudor ht. Ugly old beast with just gray primer and no chrome, but it was REALLY quick.

By then TDI was making recap cheater slicks and this guy had the biggest he could get under the fenders. He always waited to be in the last race and after he won, he kept going and left the area for his home town 15 miles away.

In typical hod rodder fashion, nobody got a look under his hood. For almost a year he did this and all anybody knew about him or the car was that it was fast and noisey and he didn't talk much.

We eventually got him to lift the hood and have a peek. Pretty as you please, there sat a Tunnel Port 427 with Hilborn injection, backed up by a top loader 4spd.

Here we were in our stock or nearly stock muscle cars, trying to outrun a low 10 second gas class car!!!

For the record and the younger readers, 10 second cars on the street in the mid 60's was almost unheard of in the North West.

In 1971, I had a 69 SS Chevelle with L88 427 4spd 4.88 gears. Couldn't make the car leave right, so I never did better than 11.1 sec 1/4 mile, but it was fun to challenge the local vette crowd on the street, and dust their butts while their girl friends watched.

Lived in Brent's part of the world then, up in Everett, WA. Local rich kid had a "Nicky" Camaro that was pretty quick. He just couldn't drive it well and I took some of his hide a time or two.

Lotta fun in those days, but it really was a different time and people were eifferent. Especially young people. In the late late 60's and early 70's, there was either the hippie/druggy crowd or the B.Y.O.L., keg party hot rodders. Late 50's and early 60's was different again, with real rock and roll music, poodle skirts, saddle oxfords for the girls and English brogues and leather jackets for the guys. Poplin jackets for those who couldn't afford leather.....like me.

The biggesst thing I think was different, was how kids acted and thought. Yeah we did crazy stuff, but rarely did anyone ever get hurt. Seemed like everybody kind of knew when to quit, whether it was a street race or a party. We didn't have knife and gun stuff and there were no gangs to worry about up here in the NW.

Like all things though, memories do get rosier with time.

Al

Let's not forget Whittier Blvd in East L.A. That was cruisin! Then when you found someone to race, you'd just drive a block down to Telegraph Road and run there. Great times. Go Willie Gee and the Midnighters!!

Hey Ron, seem to remember in your neighborhood there was a wide, straight road that was used for such things near Forest Lawn (which, when you think about it, is one of those oxymoronic names like jumbo shrimp).